


Always Something More Beautiful

by Turtles



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-28
Updated: 2012-11-28
Packaged: 2017-11-19 18:04:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 872
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/576129
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Turtles/pseuds/Turtles
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>AU where Harry is an artist and Louis is his muse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Always Something More Beautiful

**Author's Note:**

> "This is what it is to love an artist: The moon is always rising above your house. The houses of your neighbors look dull and lacking moonlight. But he is always going away from you. Inside his head there is always something more beautiful." - Eurydice, Sarah Ruhl

Harry has always been an artist and Harry has always loved Louis. At this point these are the only things that he knows to be true about himself.

In a hazy distant way he knows that he hasn't always loved Louis. There were those dull days of childhood, or the sweltering tedium of adolescence, but his whole life, his real life, began with Louis.

Harry met Louis in university, Harry was a double career for paint and photography. Louis was mucking about with an education degree, but what really caught Harry's eye was one day when he was down at one of those local hipster coffee shops. Louis took the stage and picked up the microphone and he sang this slow crooning song, and before Harry knew it he was picking up a pencil and napkin. He was sketching out the veins in Louis' neck and the flutter of his eyelashes.

Harry walked up to Louis after the show. He said Louis was beautiful and handed him the little napkin. Louis smiled soft at it, barely tugging at his lips, but his eyes were already more than half in love with Harry. A month later they were moving in together. 

Louis becomes Harry's muse. Everything he draws, everything he paints. It all comes back to him. Harry photographs Louis relentlessly. He does an entire series on Louis' hands alone. Holding a cup of tea. Curled into bed sheets. On the steering wheel of a car during their first road trip.

One weekend he brings paint home, different colors everywhere. He brings a tarp home too. He asks Louis, “Show me your body.”

Louis does and Harry paints on him and photographs him and Louis does it for Harry, because he loves him. Harry takes pictures of Louis' hands while he smokes, and he uses the tea he drinks in the morning as paint.

And Harry does this all and he loves Louis. He draws, and he photographs, and he paints. He overflows with love so completely and the only way he knows how until one day Louis gets scared. He gets scared and he says to Harry, “How. How can you love me so completely.”

It's not a question, because there is no answer. There is no answer and when Louis asks him that question Harry gets scared too, scared that Louis is afraid of his love and he says a little helplessly, “I don't know. I don't know how. But I do.”

Harry shrugs and he looks at Louis, there's no desperation in it though. It's just soft and sure the way he stares a Louis. He says again that he doesn't know how. Louis leaves.

Harry never stops drawing Louis. He draws him how he sees him, beautiful and whole. The sweep of his nose never turns sad. The cut of his jaw never fills with melancholy.

Eventually he gets a letter from Louis. Louis had always been the writer, and the letter says. 

I'm sorry I left. I think we both needed it. I want to be a person, not an idea in your head. I want to be a person, not an object you sketch out with your pencils or try and capture with your camera. I just want to be a person.

Harry cries that night. He's not quite sure why. The next day he writes back. He starts with I love you. Harry used to do that. Start things with I love you. It never really made sense to Louis, but for Harry it was just another way of spilling out. “I love you, pass me the tea.” “I love you, what's in the paper?”

So he writes, I love you. And he writes I'm not in love with you because I can draw or paint you. I don't feel things for you because I can photograph your body. I can paint you because I love you. I photograph you because you make me feel. Please come home.

Louis does. He comes back and Harry turns when the door does and Louis is just standing in the doorway. Harry could make Louis come to where he is, but he leaps over the couch and wraps Louis in his arms. He rests his head on Louis' shoulder breathing softly against his neck, where his pulse beats quickly.

In bed that night, Louis writes lyrics on Harry's body. He writes, 'truly, madly, deeply' against his hip and scrawls from the tip of his finger to his bicep, 'every time we both touch I only want more' in big bold letters. He rasps the words out to Harry in bed, singing sweetly in his ear.

He sings them to Harry on stage. Then on bigger and bigger stages, but always to Harry.

People fall in love with Louis, but never in the same way as Harry. People look at Louis, but never in the same way as Harry. It's what he tries to capture, in his film and canvas, there is always something more beautiful about Louis. He says, “I love you, could you turn the heat on?”

Louis says, “I love you too.”

He turns the heat on, because no one looks at Harry like Louis does either.


End file.
